''mall'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260331180822-00-⌔

mall - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

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Noun

mall (countable and uncountable, plural malls)

• (chiefly Canada, US, Australia, New Zealand) A pedestrianised street, especially a shopping precinct. [from 20th c.]
  • ✤ The preliminary plans provide for one million square feet of selling space in three main buildings and a double row of shops along a central shopping mall.¹
  • ✤ America′s first pedestrianized shopping mall opened in 1959 in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Like most later pedestrian malls, it was intended to revive what everybody thought was a decaying downtown.²
• An enclosed shopping centre. [from 20th c.]
  • ✤ Every day, at about the time the rest of us go to work, groups of retirees gather at many of America′s enclosed shopping malls.³
  • ✤ Cancel plans just in case you’d call/And say, “Meet me behind the mall”⁴
• (obsolete) An alley where the game of pall mall was played. [17th–19th c.]
• A public walk; a level shaded walk, a promenade. [from 18th c.]
  • ✤ Part of the area was laid out in gravel walks, and planted with elms; and these convenient and frequented walks obtained the name of the City Mall.⁵
• A heavy wooden mallet or hammer used in the game of pall mall. [from 17th c.]
  • ✤ I also fell slightly; but his fall proving a severe one, he arose in wrath, and struck me with the mall which he held in his hand, until my blood flowed copiously […]⁶
• (obsolete) The game of polo. [17th c.]
• (obsolete) An old game played with malls or mallets and balls; pall mall. [17th–19th c.]
  • ✤ But playing with the Boy ar Mall,
    (I rue the Time, and ever shall)
    I struck the Ball, I know not how⁷

Verb

mall (third-person singular simple present malls, present participle malling, simple past and past participle malled)

• to beat with a mall, or mallet; to beat with something heavy; to bruise
• to build up with the development of shopping malls
• (informal) to shop at the mall

Etymology

Probably from The Mall, a major street in London, England, which was originally a pall mall alley.

Pronunciation

• (UK)
  • (shopping centre) IPA: /mɔːl/
  • (other senses) IPA: /mæl/
  • Rhymes: -æl, Rhymes: -ɔːl
• (General American, New England, Australian, New Zealand) IPA: /mɔːl/
  • Rhymes: -ɔːl
  • Homophone: maul
  • Audio (US): 🔊
  • Audio (Australian): 🔊
    • (cot–caught merger) IPA: /mɑl/
      • Homophone: moll

Printed 2026-06-28.

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Footnotes

1. 1950 August 15, Philip Hampson, “Field’s Plans 15 to 20 Million Shopping Center for Skokie”, in Chicago Daily Tribune ‎${}^{[1]}$, page 1: ↩

2. 2002, Alexander Garvin, The American City: What Works, What Doesn′t, page 179: ↩

3. 2004, Ralph E. Warner, Get a Life: You Don′t Need a Million to Retire Well, unnumbered page: ↩

4. 2020, Taylor Swift, Jack Antonoff, “August”, in Folklore: ↩

5. 1820, Robert Southey, The Life of Wesley; and Rise and Progress of Methodism: ↩

6. 1824, James Hogg, The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner: ↩

7. 1675, Charles Cotton, Burlesque upon Burlesque: ↩